For any of you that know me personally, you know I work with a bunch of guys who really do not get my infatuation with Instagram.  That's okay.  I don't get their fascination with boobs or Starcraft, so I guess we're even.  What I have heard them say is why would you want to take a perfectly good photo and make it look old, dirty, and blurry?  What is the point to that?

My view of Times Square

As a species we enhance things all the time.  Just using drawing as an example we went from cave drawings to paper drawings that suffered from a lack of perspective.  Then, along came Filippo Brunelleschi in the early 1400's and poof we have linear perspective.  Since then it's been built on by others and now we have some amazing 3D CGI to show for our enhancements.

Market Street bridge at sunset

Getting back to Instagram though, the popularity is driven by a number of things.  One is nostalgia, the viewer may recall the days of Polaroids and black and white film, or just like the feel of being a part of a different era.  Another is the ability to move the viewer away from reality.  Depending on the filter applied, or the blur and how much of it there is, the image can become very abstract requiring imagination from the viewer to give it a meaning.  Lastly it's a way for the viewer to connect with the image, or the photographer in feelings, memories, or even experiences that the photo is depicting as well as share their own photos with others to do the same.

Carlisle, PA mural of Molly Pitcher

Instagram isn't for everyone, and that's okay.  Turns out I'm still not a fan of boobs or Starcraft and that doesn't make me a bad person either.  And to answer their question of why do I want to do that to my perfectly good photos: by running it through those blurry, dirty filters, I've made that image mine.  It means something to me and I want to share it with others so they can enjoy what I see in it.

If you'd like to see more of my Instagram photos, you can look me up (drsizer), or the last few are always on the widget here on my site.

These are my favorite photos I've enhanced with Instagram so far.  The first is a vacation photo, the second is just from my drive home, and the last is a bit of home for me.  That caboose has been a fixture of the town I grew up in for as long as I can recall.

Boldt Castle Power House

Yellow Breeches Creek

New Oxford, PA Train Station